A few years ago I climbed over a gate and found myself gazing down at a valley. After I’d been walking for a few minutes, ...

This is Part 3 of a five-part series on cognition and consciousness. Part 1 explored what we mean by "cognition." Part 2 examined neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux’s account of mental models. Here we turn ...

Picture this: a group of hairy, wild primates bounding across the African savannas stumbles upon a patch of strange mushrooms growing on dung. Curious and hungry, they eat them. Their senses sharpen, ...

Two major theories have fueled a now 1,500 year-long debate started by Saint Augustine: Is consciousness continuous, where we are conscious at each single point in time, or is it discrete, where we ...

“This retroactive idea. It has to be that,” says Nobel Prize-winning mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose, reflecting on a problem about the building blocks of reality that has dogged physics for ...

Consciousness is primarily experienced internally, but the phenomenon of out-of-body experiences (OBEs) challenges this assumption. Although scientists have developed biological-based explanations for ...

A bong rip of a theory suggests that all matter possesses some form of mind or consciousness, not just animals — including, as one biologist suggests, the Sun itself. In a fascinating dive into the ...

The controversial idea that quantum effects in the brain can explain consciousness has passed a key test. Experiments show that anaesthetic drugs reduce how long tiny structures found in brain cells ...

A new study provides early evidence of a surge of activity correlated with consciousness in the dying brain. Reports of near-death experiences -- with tales of white light, visits from departed loved ...